CIA/NICARAGUA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01070R000301450004-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 6, 2010
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: October 27, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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RADIO TV REPORTS, INC.
4701 WILLARD AVENUE, CHEVY CHASE, MARYLAND 20815 [phone]
FOR PUBLIC AFFAIRS STAFF
PROGRAM The Big Story STATION CNN-TV
DATE October 27, 1984 8:00 A.M. CITY Atlanta, Ga.
SUBJECT CIA/Nicaragua
DON MILLER: Central America is a quagmire for the
United States. That's what Uncle Sam is learning at heavy cost.
American troops are still stationed in Grenada one year after the
invasion. In December, U.S. troops plan to join Honduran and
Salvadoran units in a military maneuver. One exercise is
expected to send American forces into El Salvador. And Nicaragua
has protested to the United Nations that the United States is
teaching rebels how to kill officials.
The Big Story this week, U.S. troubles to the South.
The CIA manual prepared for Nicaragua's rebels has since
been withdrawn. But that hasn't stopped the U.N.
REPORTER: U.N. sources say about 4200 copies of the CIA
manual and. the Nicaraguan letter have been printed in English
alone. The document is being translated by the U.N. into five
other languages. Copies will eventually find their way into
public libraries and other U.N. offices around the world.
REPORTER: American officials in Washington are noting
the twist irony in the U.N.'s publication of the CIA manual. The
United States funds about 25 percent of the U.N. budget, in-
cluding publication costs.
MILLER: Last Tuesday, four officers of the high command
of El Salvador's Army were aboard a helicopter when it exploded
in flight. They were all killed.
REPORTER: The soldiers still patrol Morazon province.
The war still goes on there. This despite the loss in a helicop-
ter crash of El Salvador's best-known soldier, Colonel Domingo
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Monterrosa, and several of his top assistants. But while those
commemorating their deaths could philosophically accept it as
almost an inevitability in a war that has gone on for five years
now, the Salvadoran Army is faced with its biggest setback in
years.
MILLER: Last weekend a small plane carrying four
American employees of the CIA crashed in El Salvador.
REPORTER: He died suddenly. That was Curtis Wood's
epitaph in a paid obituary in Tuesday's Atlanta Constitution
newspaper. There are reports that Wood worked for the Central
Intelligence Agency, that he was one of the four CIA employees
killed in a fiery plane crash last weekend in El Salvador. The
CIA isn't saying anything about Wood.
Richard Spicer's family and friends buried him Monday in
Warren, Pennsylvania. The local paper said Spicer died in
southern Florida. But the New York Times reports Spicer worked
for the CIA. At the funeral, no one mentioned how Richard Spicer
died. The CIA had no comment.
It was no secret Scott van Leeshout (?) worked for the
CIA. Nonetheless, his mother was shocked when a man from the
agency knocked on the door of the Van Leeshout home in Cudahy,
Wisconsin. He said Scott had been killed in a car crash in
Miami. But a local TV station had a different story. They said
Scott van Leeshout had been killed when the CIA plane crashed
into a volcano in El Salvador. The CIA would not comment.
There were four men on the plane. Perhaps three are
accounted for. Perhaps the fourth never will be publicly. But
he will be remembered.
In the lobby of the Central Intelligence Agency's
Headquarters in Langley, Virginia there is a memorial to the
agency's fallen warriors. "In honor of the members of the CIA,"
it reads, "who gave their life in the service of their country."
There are stars carved in the marble beneath the inscription, one
star for each CIA employee killed in the line of duty. There are
46 stars on the wall now. But no one knows if there were 42 last
Friday or if there will soon be 50. The CIA has no comment.
MILLER: In Grenada, an anniversary.
REPORTER: The beels pealed out from the capital's
cathedral high above St. George's marking the first anniversary
of liberation day in Grenada.
The American forces here on Grenada marked this day with
a special service of their own at their base across town, where
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they remembered their fallen comrades. The ceremony was re-
strained. The highest-ranking American dignitaries in attendance
were U.S. Ambassador Loren Loretz (?) and the chief of U.S.
forces in the Caribbean, Commander R.R. Hedges.
COMMANDER R.R. HEDGES: It is indeed fitting and proper
that we join here today to pay tribute to our 19 comrades in arms
who made the ultimate sacrifice one year ago today.
REPORTER: According to Commander Hedges, the 300 or so
American troops in Grenada can expect to remain here until the
middle of next year, long enough to guarantee the elections in
December and long enough to insure that 19 American soldiers
didn't die in vain.
MILLER: Still to come, an inside look at how the
invasion was planned.
MILLER: This past week marked the first anniversary of
the American invasion'of Grenada, but the Pentagon still is
reluctant to discuss details of that operation.
REPORTER: A year after the invasion, all is quiet in
Grenada. Only about 250 military personnel are still on the
island liberated a year ago by a U.S. military operation that the
Pentagon pointed to with pride as an example of a successful
military operation. But in the United States, the Grenada
invasion is a very hot topic. The operation, in which 19
Americans died, has come under increasing criticism in recent
days. Among the critics, retired Admiral Gene LaRocque.
ADMIRAL GENE LAROCQUE: The whole military affair was
pretty well botched up. We needlessly killed civilians, had many
of our own men killed needlessly. And the problems basically
stem from the fact that we tried to do it in a big hurry and,
secondly, in great secrecy.
REPORTER: One criticism is that it took more than 5000
men to subdue a force of roughly 700 Cubans and a Grenadian Army
that hardly fought at all. Another was that all branches of the
military wanted to get into the act, and that what should have
been a simple task was complicated by participation of all the
services.
ADMIRAL LAROCQUE: I think the big lesson in Grenada, in
my view, is that if we're going to conduct a surprise operation
of that kind somewhere, it ought to be put under the aegis of one
service. The United States Marine Corps, in my view, with
200,000 people, could more easily have handled that operation
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coherently, and they would have understood what the other groups
were doing.
REPORTER: Other critics share that view, including
William Lynn, President of the Military Reform Institute, who
authored a report critical of the operation. Still critical,
Lynn told CNN, "It seems the main lesson from Grenada is the
military's refusal to learn lessons."
In his regular briefing, Pentagon spokesman Michael
Burch addressed the question this way:
MICHAEL BURCH: Most of the documents that would be
meaningful to you are classified. We have had an effort underway
to see if portions or an unclassified version can be put out.
REPORTER: But the Pentagon and its critics agree that
the operation did provide a valuable combat test for some of its
special forces and gave the military a badly needed boost in
morale.
Burch defended the operation.
BURCH: There seems to be an effort to draw away from
the bottom line on Grenada, which is that it was a military
success. The U.S. military is proud of that accomplishment. The
fact that lives were lost and men were wounded is always regret-
table, but it was a dangerous mission, one accomplished with
daring, professionalism and efficiency.
REPORTER: There can be litle question that the opera-
tion in Grenada was a success, in the sense that it accomplished
the objectives set out for it: the rescue of the medical
students and freeing of the island's political leaders.
And there was a report that Special Force units at-
tempting to land before the Rangers parachuted in to clear the
airfield had botched their operation.
BURCH: The authors of these latest reports must have
some other motivation. And a serious unfounded claim is that
Americans died -- that more Americans died than what we reported.
That's not true, and in fact it's a lie.
REPORTER: Burch admitted there were Special Forces
operations on Grenada before the Rangers parachuted in. There
wer no casualties, he said, but other details of the operation
are still classified. He said published reports of cowardice
under fire during the operation had been thoroughly investigated,
and there was no substantiation to the charges..
REPORTER: At least 19 U.S. troops were killed, 116
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wounded, many of them part of America's elite Special Operations
troops. Sources within Special Operations have told CNN that
differences in tactics and operating philosophies may have been
the cause of the unexpected casualty rate. According to these
sources, the overall commander of the Grenada operation, Admiral
Wesley MacDonald, initially proposed an all-Navy-and-Marine
operation. But General John Vessey, the Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, felt that MacDonald's proposed force would be
inadequate for the task. Vessey ordered in Army Major General
Richard Schultes' supersecret Special Operations forces.
According to the sources, during the weekend of the 22nd
and 23rd of October, secret meetings were held to plan the
invasion. MacDonald proposed a coordinated attack just prior to
dawn on Tuesday, the 25th. According to sources, General
Schultes clashed bitterly with Admiral MacDonald. Schultes
argued that his men, Army Rangers and direct-action Special
Forces Delta Teams, along with Navy Seals and Air Force teams,
were small, highly trained units designed for swift, vicious
night assaults. A daylight attack would deprive them of their
stealth and much of their effectiveness. Schultes wanted to
infiltrate by at least 2:00 A.M., giving his men the maximum
cover of darkness. MacDonald, a Navy aviator whose expertise was
that of a conventional commander, say the sources, overruled
General Schultes and ordered a 5:00 A.M. attack, 58 minutes
before dawn.
On Tuesday morning an aircraft navigation problem and a
thunderstorm off their intended target, the Point Salines
airfield on the island's southern tip, delayed the Ranger attack
by 27 minutes. Worse, antiaircraft fire drove off two of the
three C-130s in the first attack wave, leaving only about 40
Rangers on the ground to fight it out by themselves. Almost half
an hour later, the rest of the Rangers jumped, assaulting in
daylight and without surprise. The Rangers took the airfield,
but lost five men in the process.
Special Operations sources say that if the Rangers had
gone in at 2:00 A.M., the delay would have been covered by
darkness, and casualties would have been lower. According to the
sources, other failures are also linked to the 5:00 A.M. attack
decision. A delay forced Delta commandos to attack mountaintop
Richmond Hill prison in broad daylight. One pilot was killed, a
chopper destroyed, and several commandos were wounded. The
mission failed.
At about the same time, another unplanned daylight raid
by Delta against the fortified Calavigny Barracks was driven off.
A Seal team, also delayed, attempted to rescue Governor
General Scoon. One of two choppers was driven off, and only half
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the team was landed. The Seals and Scoon were surrounded. With
dying radios, they used the local phone to contact the Rangers.
An AC-130 was able to lay down cannon fire until they were
rescued.
A Seal raid on Radio Grenada put the station out of
action, but the Seals had to hastily retreat, escaping to the
sea. They swam for nine hours until they were picked up.
Both Admiral MacDonald and General Schultes have
declined interviews. However, sources within Special Operations
have told CNN that the kinds of failures that occurred in Grenada
will occur again in the future until a real undestanding of how
to employ these elite, highly skilled units penetrates the
mind-set of the conventional military.
REPORTER: The threat of Castro's communism in bed with
the island's political leaders was wiped out by the American
military action. Beyond that, Grenada has changed little in the
year since. Forty percent of the 120,000 inhabitants remain
unemployed.
While the signs of America's military rescue remain
graffiti on many a stone wall, the sense one gets from the young
people is that they would just as soon all the foreigners left.
The emotions on the island are as mixed as the beliefs of its
political parties. The promised rebuilding of the economy has
not happened. Fifty-seven million dollars in U.S. aid is slow in
coming, much of the money earmarked to build roads and sewers and
a water system. Tourism remains at a trickle. Some people
remain optimistic. Others don't.
Any better now than it was a year ago?
MAN: I haven't seen it yet at all. I'll have to wait
and see. I, personally, haven't seen anything yet. I suppose it
will take some time before anything has been, you know, like
development and so will take place.
REPORTER: The American military remains an ever-present
sight, a reminder that Grenada is still an island without its own
elected government. In the capital city, St. George's, troops
and jeeps patrol the streets.
For an island of 130 square miles, Grenada is in the
midst of an agonizing transition, wrestling with more problems
than it can hope to handle on its own.
WOMAN: The fact is that at no moment were the American
lives ever threatened. In fact, the then four-day-old military
regime, whom I certainly do not agree with, but it must be stated
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for the record, and the Administration knows this, that they
telexed a communication to the U.S. Embassy in Barbados in-
dicating that, almost over and above the lives of the Grenadian
citizens, the lives of all foreigners would be protected. And
there was absolutely no justification in terms of the political
or physical threat.
NEWSMAN:: The Americans have already committed $57
million to the country, six million in a revitalization project
now and another six million in a public works program to help
ease the jobless situation there. Would you say that Grenada is
better off now than it was before the American invasion, under
those circumstances?
WOMAN: Not at all. Grenada -- there is a small section
of the Grenadian population who may be in a position to take
advantage of the U.S. invstment, the small business elite. And
they're very small. We have a very small indigenous capitalistic
class. By and large, the vast majority of the Grenadian people,
their conditions have been worsened.
You mentioned unemployment. Unemployment has gone from
14 percent a year ago to anywhere between 33 to 60 percent.
People are not better off.
MAN: I think Grenada is a great deal better off. I
think it's better off not because we've solved all its problems
for it, which is something we never set out to do and nothing we
really can do for another people. I think it's better off
because we've turned control of Grenada back to the Grenadians
themselves, because we've given them the opportunity to build on
the institutions, the democratic institutions which are very much
a part of their tradition and which are going to allow them to
hold their first free election in a long time on December 3rd.
MILLER: In Washington Thursday, it was a day of
tribute, not only to those who rescued the American students,
but, it seemed, to the students themselves.
PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN: Together, we celebrate today,
with joy, an anniversary of honor for America.
REPORTER: For President Reagan's first anniversary
celebration of the U.S. invasion of Grenada, the White House
staged a ceremony with 90 of the several hundred American medical
students who were evacuated from Grenada after the Marines
landed.
PRESIDENT REAGAN: Many questioned our will to continue
as a leader of the Western Alliance and to remain a force for
good in the world. But I believe this period of self-doubt is
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over. History will record that one of the turning points came on
a small island in the Caribbean where America went to take care
of her own.
REPORTER: Kathleen Major, a 30-year-old nurse-turned-
medical-student, was among the evacuees from Grenada a year ago.
She gave President Reagan a plaque expressing the students'
gratitude for the invasion. At a Capitol Hill luncheon earlier,
she talked about her gratitude to the 19 servicemen who died on
Grenada.
KATHLEEN MAJOR: I said to a soldier, "You just risked
your life for me."
And he said, "I'm a Ranger, ma'am." He said, "That's my
job." He says, "There will never be another American hostage as
long as we can do something about it."
REPORTER: There was a wreath-laying ceremony Wednesday
for the one serviceman killed on Grenada and buried at Arlington
National Cemetery, Army paratrooper Shawn Lucatina (?). Lucatina
was fatally wounded on his 23rd birthday. His father, Robin
Lucatina, is a retired military officer.
ROBIN LUCATINA: No one likes to lose a son. I'm glad
he died in a just cause, helping people who wanted to be helped.
PRESIDENT REAGAN: Shawn Lucatina gave his life in the
cause of freedom. This courage and love of country is also what
we saw in Beirut at virtually the same time. And we will always
honor those brave Americans. Let no one doubt that those brave
men were heroes, every bit as much, in their peace-keeping
mission as were our men in the rescue mission in Grenada.
REPORTER: There has been no White House ceremony this
week, less than two weeks before the election, to remind voters
of Beirut.
MAN: Grenada today is back on the democratic path. The
press is free. There are no political prisoners.
REPORTER: An enormous new airport begun by Cuban
construction workers and denounced by President Reagan as a
military threat to the United States has now been completed with
American aid. And Reagan Administration officials now admit the
airport could be militarily useful to the U.S. They say it was
only a threat when it was being used by Soviet clients.
Even opponents of the Grenada invasion concede it has
had some foreign policy benefits. It gave Grenada a chance to
reestablish democracy. It demonstrated U.S. readiness to respond
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to Caribbean requests for help. And it traded a loss of prestige
for Cuba and the Soviets for a gain in American credibility in
Latin America. The gain in U.S. credibility has also put fear in
the hearts of others Soviet clients in the region. Nicaragua's
Marxist government has prepared its people for an American
invasion and has, since Grenada, joined in negotiations with the
Reagan Administration on Central American peace.
MILLER: On Thursday night, Decima (?) Williams was
arrested in Washington as an illegal alien. This after the
U.S.-supported government in Grenada revoked her diplomatic
passport.
Still to come, the CIA's secret activity.
MILLER: A big question for the United States is just
how far should the CIA go in secretly and illegally helping our
friends abroad.
REPORTER: Former CIA Director William Colby acknow-
ledges there is a need to keep an eye on the agency, that
congressional oversight is the way.
WILLIAM COLBY: The benefits that it gives, I think, is
that if something happens abroad and it turns out not to have
been all the wisest of actions -- and sometimes intelligence
opeations are high-risk and sometimes they fail -- then the
question is not whether CIA was some rogue elephant, which it
never has been, but rather that we Americans made a mistake,
through our constitutional system.
REPORTER: The CIA mining of the Nicaraguan harbors of
Corinto, Porto Sandino and El Bluff, and the earlier raid on the
oil storage tanks at Corinto showed oversight is far from
perfect, not nearly as smooth a process as the handling of the
recommendation for the covert action itself, from the National
Security Council's senior inter-agency group to the President.
His signature authorizes the operation.
Author and intelligence community analyst David Wise.
DAVID WISE: Oversight has not worked sufficiently to
please, I think, anyone watching the process. And the mining of
the harbors of Nicaragua was not an aberration, it was an example
of why it hasn't worked. And I think it has to be tightened up.
REPORTER: Congressman Dave McCurdy of Oklahoma, a
member of the House Intelligence Committee:
REP. DAVE MCCURDY: The operations are many times begun
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by the presidential directive, and then we are later informed.
The only true key that we have to any of this or any hammer, if
you will, is the appropriations process.
REPORTER: On the scope of U.S. covert action in Central
REP. MCCURDY: A lot of people are now trying to put
blame on us or make issue of the blame. But that's not the case.
We've stated it clearly along the way, tried to stop it every way
that we had to. And it still is continuing.
REPORTER: Describing its own role, the CIA claims it
walks a new and fine line between an openness in government
Americans have come to expect and the secrecy that intelligence,
by its very nature, demands.
MAN: It's just a different animal. And because it's
covert and secret to begin with, and you've got people who spend
their lifetime and are highly skilled at deception, one of the
groups they're going to deceive from time to time will be the
Congress.
REPORTER: There are those who say the image of the
Central Intelligence Agency now is as bad as it's been at any
time since the investigations of the mid-'70s, that the glare of
publicity not only erodes the agency's credibility, but also
interferes with the CIA's major function: gathering and analyz-
ing foreign intelligence.
MILLER: Producing democracy in Central America and on
the Caribbean island of Grenada is no easy task. As we have
seen, there are some signs of progress. Nicaragua will hold an
election two days before our own. But the government's opposi-
tion has cried foul and won't participate. Grenadans will vote a
month later; yet the people are running low on enthusiasm for
their future. And in El Salvador, President Duarte met with
rebel leaders to find some basis for peace, but they could agree
only to meet again. In the past five years of civil war, that
small country has buried 50,000 casualties.
The Big Story this week, U.S. troubles to the South.
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